Conspiracy Theory Rock; Zoroastrianism is still with us; War profits & KBR: not that profitable?

Robert Smigel had this awesome cartoon on a March 1998 SNL called "Conspiracy Theory Rock" which was really quite amazing (QuickTime link), as noted in this Times story. It only aired once, and has subsequently been deleted from reruns – instead they run the second Backstreet Boys performance. Basically it conveys, in typical Smigel style, the conflicts of interest and shady military money flows of the major corporate media – and the NBC peacock does embarrassing stuff. More on it here.

Who was Zoroaster? A Persian prophet around 1700 BC who gave us the concepts of cosmological good versus evil, the afterlife and the Judgment Day. The Persian king found this to be a handy way to generate a more coherent and submissive population, so Zoroastrianism became the state religion of Persia. Even though there are fire temples around Asia today, it is still very obscure. The fire temples all have continuously burning fires that are the representations, though not considered supernatural, of Ahura Mazda, the Light. The fires have been burning for centuries. (images from Wikipedia)

Zoroaster's influence went east, where it infused the foundations of Buddhism, and west, where it got into post-Babylonian Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Zoroastrianism is an interesting and under-appreciated pillar of monotheism, and in a sense today you could say we are dealing with a kind of Zoroastrian manichaeism run amok. At least that was the point of this DailyKos entry about the Prisoners of Zarathustra. Also, Zoroastrianism has really freakin' cool Babylon-style art.

War Profiteering ain't that profitable? Slate: War profiteering—harder than it looks. By Daniel Gross. A lot of interesting points about the structure of how KBR works. Also check out this thing from PBS Frontline, it was quite detailed and long, but a fascinating interview about how in the military-industrial complex, contractors beget subcontractors up to six levels deep. Even more interesting, those psychopathic guys from CACI and Titan Corporation who were working as private quasi-CIA interrogators at Abu Ghraib had no government oversight officers inside Iraq at all. In other words, there is some kind of mercenary hydra beast with absolutely no checks on it. And it's stealing your money: Frontline: Outsourcing military services is in vogue. Why? An interview with Steven Schooner. Just a few things to kick around.... Try PrivateForces.com for more on the privatized / mercenary military companies.